Chris Brown should pay $13 million in damages to the housekeeper who was mauled by a large safety canine on his property in December 2020, a California jury determined Tuesday.
Brown and his firm Black Pyramid LLC should pay $12.9 million in damages to the housekeeper, Maria Avila, for negligence, stated Michael C. Murphy Jr., a lawyer representing her sister, Patricia Avila. Patricia, who was working with Maria when the assault occurred, was awarded $885,000 for emotional misery. Maria’s husband Oscar Olivo — who claimed his spouse’s accidents affected their marriage, depriving him of the intimacy they’d earlier than — was individually awarded $50,000. Billboard was first to report the information.
“After greater than 5 years of litigating in opposition to Chris Brown, we’re thrilled that we had been capable of get justice for our consumer, Patricia. We’re so comfortable for her and her household after all the things they went via on that horrible day. It was an honor to characterize her,” Murphy stated in a press release to Rolling Stone.
Maria Avila gave emotional testimony on the two-week trial, breaking down on the witness stand as she described the Dec. 12, 2020, mauling at Brown’s residence within the Tarzana neighborhood of Los Angeles. She stated the assault left her with extreme accidents to her arm and face, intensive scarring, and post-traumatic stress dysfunction.
“I’ll by no means be the identical once more,” she advised jurors within the courtroom in Van Nuys, California, on June 24.
Testifying in Spanish via an interpreter, Avila described a grueling restoration. She stated surgeons harvested pores and skin from her stomach to graft onto her mangled arm, leaving her in excessive ache and unable to bend on the waist. The lacerations to her face required dozens of stitches. Pandemic restrictions barred her household from visiting throughout her 5 days within the hospital, forcing her to endure the ordeal alone.
A mom of three, Avila advised jurors that nerve harm and power sensitivity on her left facet nonetheless make it arduous for her to sleep and perform primary day by day duties. She now not has the arm power to wash flooring or wring out a mop, she stated. In the meantime, the assault additionally left her afraid of all canine. That worry, mixed together with her bodily limitations, has successfully ended her profession as a housekeeper, since most of her former purchasers personal canine, she stated.
Avila’s daughter, Yoseline Espinoza, testified after her mom, recalling the panicked name she acquired from her aunt, Patricia Avila, who had additionally been working on the home that day and filed her personal claims in opposition to Brown. “She was simply freaking out, telling me, ‘Your mother can’t breathe. She retains passing out on me. The ambulance remains to be not right here. Chris Brown fled the scene,’” Espinoza testified. “I didn’t suppose she was going to make it.”
Brown, 37, testified as the primary witness on the trial. He advised jurors he heard the canine, Hades, growling outdoors and rushed downstairs to seek out Avila face down and immobile on the bottom. He advised jurors he locked up the canine, referred to as out to his safety guard to summon assist, and bent down to verify Avila was respiration. He acknowledged he didn’t personally name 911, saying he feared a recording could be leaked to the media. He additionally stated he by no means touched Avila, provided her water, introduced her a towel, or gave her any consolation past telling her assist was on the way in which.
Describing Avila’s accidents for the jury, the singer pointed to his brow and traced a finger down his nostril and underneath his eye. “It was reduce, like, severed,” he stated. “I do know it’s graphic, however you can see the pores and skin was form of raised. You may see the reduce and the blood popping out. …It was numerous blood.”
Brown stated he left his property earlier than paramedics arrived as a result of he’s a celeb. He stated his supervisor allegedly steered it. He additionally confirmed he by no means requested his safety to protect his residence surveillance video from the incident.
“What would have been the issue with you being there and ready for paramedics to get there with a lady bleeding in your driveway? Why would that be an issue for you as a celeb?” Avila’s lawyer, Nancy Doumanian, requested, incredulous.
“Due to how my picture is and all the time used. I didn’t desire a deceptive story, or like a circus, from my standing. It’s fairly sticky in relation to that. So me staying out of the way in which was suggested,” he stated.
“Didn’t you suppose your repute would take an even bigger hit for those who fled the scene?” Doumanian pressed.
Brown stated he didn’t flee. He stated he spent a few hours driving round and stopped at a gasoline station earlier than he was suggested it was protected to return residence.
Avila testified that she didn’t know the massive Caucasian Shepherd, also called a Central Asian Ovcharka, was on the property that day. She advised jurors she solely noticed Brown’s two different canine, small French bulldogs, and she or he denied Brown’s declare that he warned her to not go outdoors with out an escort as a result of there was a 3rd canine on the property that was not pleasant.
Talking softly, Avila stated she had gone outdoors to empty a vacuum bag when the assault occurred, and that she will be able to solely recall flashes of the mauling and its aftermath. She advised jurors she needed to depart the courtroom throughout opening statements when graphic photographs of her accidents had been displayed, and that she nonetheless hasn’t been ready to take a look at them. “It’s very arduous for me. I can’t,” she stated.
Along with her fingers visibly shaking, she rolled up her left sleeve and walked to the jury field, turning her gaze to the wall as jurors examined the raised and pitted pores and skin overlaying a lot of her forearm. She then eliminated her glasses and swept again her bangs to disclose a sample of scars operating from beneath her left eye up throughout her brow.
Earlier than trial, Brown admitted negligence underneath California’s dog-bite statute in a court docket submitting. He continued to dispute the extent of Avila’s accidents and claimed she was partly at fault for going outdoors alone. Brown’s lawyer acknowledged throughout jury choice that Avila was entitled to some damages however stated there was a “distinction of opinion” over the quantity.
A number of potential jurors had been dismissed early within the choice course of after saying they might not be neutral due to Brown’s 2009 felony assault conviction involving his then-girlfriend Rihanna. The choose beforehand dominated that historical past was not related to the case, however the potential jurors introduced it up on their very own.
This text was up to date on June 30 at 11:21 p.m. ET to incorporate a press release from Michael C. Murphy, Jr., an lawyer for Patricia Avila.
